Shame
Encyclopedia
Shame is, variously, an affect
Affect (psychology)
Affect refers to the experience of feeling or emotion. Affect is a key part of the process of an organism's interaction with stimuli. The word also refers sometimes to affect display, which is "a facial, vocal, or gestural behavior that serves as an indicator of affect" .The affective domain...

, emotion
Emotion
Emotion is a complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical and environmental influences. In humans, emotion fundamentally involves "physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience." Emotion is associated with mood,...

, cognition
Cognition
In science, cognition refers to mental processes. These processes include attention, remembering, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions. Cognition is studied in various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science...

, state, or condition. The roots of the word shame are thought to derive from an older word meaning to cover; as such, covering oneself, literally or figuratively, is a natural expression of shame.

Description

Nineteenth century scientist Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...

, in his book The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals is a book by Charles Darwin, published in 1872, concerning genetically determined aspects of behaviour. It was published thirteen years after On The Origin of Species and is, along with his 1871 book The Descent of Man, Darwin's main consideration...

, described shame affect as consisting of blushing
Blushing
Blushing refers to the involuntary reddening of a person's face due to embarrassment or emotional stress, though it has been known to come from being lovestruck, or from some kind of romantic stimulation. It is thought that blushing is the result of an overactive sympathetic nervous system...

, confusion of mind, downward cast eyes, slack posture, and lowered head, and he noted observations of shame affect in human populations worldwide. He also noted the sense of warmth or heat (associated with the vasodilation of the face and skin) occurring in intense shame.

A "sense of shame" is the consciousness or awareness of shame as a state or condition. Such shame cognition
Cognition
In science, cognition refers to mental processes. These processes include attention, remembering, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions. Cognition is studied in various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science...

 may occur as a result of the experience of shame affect or, more generally, in any situation of embarrassment
Embarrassment
Embarrassment is an emotional state of intense discomfort with oneself, experienced upon having a socially unacceptable act or condition witnessed by or revealed to others. Usually some amount of loss of honour or dignity is involved, but how much and the type depends on the embarrassing situation...

, dishonor, disgrace, inadequacy, humiliation
Humiliation
Humiliation is the abasement of pride, which creates mortification or leads to a state of being humbled or reduced to lowliness or submission. It can be brought about through bullying, intimidation, physical or mental mistreatment or trickery, or by embarrassment if a person is revealed to have...

, or chagrin
Chagrin
Chagrin may refer to:*The Chagrin River*Chagrin Falls, Ohio*Chagrin Falls Township, Cuyahoga County, Ohio*Chagrin Falls High School...

.

A condition or state of shame may also be assigned externally, by others, regardless of the one's own experience or awareness. "To shame" generally means to actively assign or communicate a state of shame to another. Behaviors designed to "uncover" or "expose" others are sometimes used for this purpose, as are utterances like "Shame!" or "Shame on you!"

Finally, to "have shame" means to maintain a sense of restraint against offending others (as with modesty
Modesty
Standards of modesty are aspects of the culture of a country or people, at a given point in time, and is a measure against which an individual in society may be judged....

, humility
Humility
Humility is the quality of being modest, and respectful. Humility, in various interpretations, is widely seen as a virtue in many religious and philosophical traditions, being connected with notions of transcendent unity with the universe or the divine, and of egolessness.-Term:The term "humility"...

, and deference
Deference
Deference is the condition of submitting to the espoused, legitimate influence of one's superior or superiors. Deference implies a yielding or submitting to the judgment of a recognized superior out of respect or reverence...

) while to "have no shame" is to behave without such restraint (as with excessive pride or hubris
Hubris
Hubris , also hybris, means extreme haughtiness, pride or arrogance. Hubris often indicates a loss of contact with reality and an overestimation of one's own competence or capabilities, especially when the person exhibiting it is in a position of power....

).

Shame vs. guilt and embarrassment

The location of the dividing line between the concepts of shame, guilt
Guilt
Guilt is the state of being responsible for the commission of an offense. It is also a cognitive or an emotional experience that occurs when a person realizes or believes—accurately or not—that he or she has violated a moral standard, and bears significant responsibility for that...

, and embarrassment
Embarrassment
Embarrassment is an emotional state of intense discomfort with oneself, experienced upon having a socially unacceptable act or condition witnessed by or revealed to others. Usually some amount of loss of honour or dignity is involved, but how much and the type depends on the embarrassing situation...

 is not fully standardized.

According to cultural anthropologist Ruth Benedict
Ruth Benedict
Ruth Benedict was an American anthropologist, cultural relativist, and folklorist....

, shame is a violation of cultural or social values while guilt feelings arise from violations of one's internal values. Thus, it is possible to feel ashamed of thought or behavior that no one knows about and to feel guilty about actions that gain the approval of others.

Psychoanalyst Helen B. Lewis argued that, "The experience of shame is directly about the self, which is the focus of evaluation. In guilt, the self is not the central object of negative evaluation, but rather the thing done is the focus." Similarly, Fossum and Mason say in their book Facing Shame that "While guilt is a painful feeling of regret and responsibility for one's actions, shame is a painful feeling about oneself as a person." Following this line of reasoning, Psychiatrist Judith Lewis Herman concludes that "Shame is an acutely self-conscious state in which the self is 'split,' imagining the self in the eyes of the other; by contrast, in guilt the self is unified."

Clinical psychologist Gershen Kaufman's view of shame is derived from that of Affect Theory
Affect theory
In psychology, affect is an emotion or subjectively experienced feeling. Affect theory is a branch of psychoanalysis that attempts to organize affects into discrete categories and connect each one with its typical response. So, for example, the affect of joy is observed through the reaction of...

, namely that shame is one of a set of instinctual, short-duration physiological reactions to stimulation. In this view, guilt is considered to be a learned behavior consisting essentially of self-directed blame
Blame
Blame is the act of censuring, holding responsible, making negative statements about an individual or group that their action or actions are socially or morally irresponsible, the opposite of praise. When someone is morally responsible for doing something wrong their action is blameworthy...

 or contempt
Contempt
Contempt is an intensely negative emotion regarding a person or group of people as inferior, base, or worthless—it is similar to scorn. It is also used when people are being sarcastic. Contempt is also defined as the state of being despised or dishonored; disgrace, and an open disrespect or willful...

, with shame occurring consequent to such behaviors making up a part of the overall experience of guilt. Here, self-blame and self-contempt mean the application, towards (a part of) one's self, of exactly the same dynamic that blaming of, and contempt for, others represents when it is applied interpersonally. Kaufman saw that mechanisms such as blame or contempt may be used as a defending strategy against the experience of shame and that someone who has a pattern of applying them to himself may well attempt to defend against a shame experience by applying self-blame or self-contempt. This, however, can lead to an internalized, self-reinforcing sequence of shame events for which Kaufman coined the term "shame spiral".

One view of difference between shame and embarrassment says that shame does not necessarily involve public humiliation while embarrassment does, that is, one can feel shame for an act known only to oneself but in order to be embarrassed one's actions must be revealed to others. In the field of ethics (moral psychology, in particular), however, there is debate as to whether or not shame is a heteronomous emotion, i.e. whether or not shame does involve recognition on the part of the ashamed that they have been judged negatively by others. Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....

 and his followers held that shame is heteronomous; Bernard Williams
Bernard Williams
Sir Bernard Arthur Owen Williams was an English moral philosopher, described by The Times as the most brilliant and most important British moral philosopher of his time. His publications include Problems of the Self , Moral Luck , Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy , and Truth and Truthfulness...

 and others have argued that shame can be autonomous. Shame may carry the connotation of a response to something that is morally wrong whereas embarrassment is the response to something that is morally neutral but socially unacceptable. Another view of shame and embarrassment says that the two emotions lie on a continuum and only differ in intensity.

Subtypes

  • Genuine shame: is associated with genuine dishonor, disgrace, or condemnation.

  • False shame: is associated with false condemnation as in the double-bind form of false shaming; "he brought what we did to him upon himself". Author and TV personality John Bradshaw
    John Bradshaw (author)
    John Elliot Bradshaw is an American educator, counselor, motivational speaker and author who has hosted a number of PBS television programs on topics such as addiction, recovery, codependency and spirituality. Bradshaw is active in the self-help movement, and is credited with popularizing such...

     calls shame the "emotion that lets us know we are finite".

  • Secret shame: describes the idea of being ashamed to be ashamed, so causing ashamed people to keep their shame a secret.

  • Toxic shame: describes false, pathological shame, and Bradshaw states that toxic shame is induced, inside children, by all forms of child abuse. Incest
    Incest
    Incest is sexual intercourse between close relatives that is usually illegal in the jurisdiction where it takes place and/or is conventionally considered a taboo. The term may apply to sexual activities between: individuals of close "blood relationship"; members of the same household; step...

     and other forms of child sexual abuse
    Child sexual abuse
    Child sexual abuse is a form of child abuse in which an adult or older adolescent uses a child for sexual stimulation. Forms of child sexual abuse include asking or pressuring a child to engage in sexual activities , indecent exposure with intent to gratify their own sexual desires or to...

     can cause particularly severe toxic shame. Toxic shame often induces what is known as complex trauma
    Psychological trauma
    Psychological trauma is a type of damage to the psyche that occurs as a result of a traumatic event...

     in children who cannot cope with toxic shaming as it occurs and who dissociate the shame until it is possible to cope with.

  • Vicarious shame: In the 1990s, psychologists introduced the notion of vicarious shame, which refers to the experience of shame on behalf of another person. Individuals vary in their tendency to experience vicarious shame, which is related to neuroticism
    Neurosis
    Neurosis is a class of functional mental disorders involving distress but neither delusions nor hallucinations, whereby behavior is not outside socially acceptable norms. It is also known as psychoneurosis or neurotic disorder, and thus those suffering from it are said to be neurotic...

     and to the tendency to experience personal shame. Extremely shame-prone people might even experience vicarious shame even to an increased degree, in other words: shame on behalf of another person who is already feeling shame on behalf of a third party (or possibly on behalf of the individual proper).

Narcissism

It has been suggested that narcissism
Narcissism
Narcissism is a term with a wide range of meanings, depending on whether it is used to describe a central concept of psychoanalytic theory, a mental illness, a social or cultural problem, or simply a personality trait...

 in adults is related to defenses against shame and that narcissistic personality disorder
Narcissistic personality disorder
Narcissistic personality disorder is a personality disorder in which the individual is described as being excessively preoccupied with issues of personal adequacy, power, prestige and vanity...

 is connected to shame as well. Psychiatrist Glen Gabbard
Glen Gabbard
Glen Owens Gabbard is an American psychiatrist known for authoring professional teaching texts for the field. He is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas and Professor of Psychiatry at SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, New York...

 suggested that NPD could be broken down into two subtypes, a grandiose, arrogant, thick-skinned "oblivious" subtype and an easily hurt, oversensitive, ashamed "hypervigilant
Hypervigilance
Hypervigilance is an enhanced state of sensory sensitivity accompanied by an exaggerated intensity of behaviors whose purpose is to detect threats. Hypervigilance is also accompanied by a state of increased anxiety which can cause exhaustion. Other symptoms include: abnormally increased arousal, a...

" subtype. The oblivious subtype presents for admiration
Narcissistic supply
Narcissistic supply is a concept in some psychoanalytic theories which describes a type of admiration, interpersonal support or sustenance drawn by an individual from his or her environment ....

, envy, and appreciation a grandiose self that is the antithesis of a weak internalized self which hides in shame, while the hypervigilant subtype neutralizes devaluation by seeing others as unjust abusers.

Social aspects

Shame is considered one aspect of socialization
Socialization
Socialization is a term used by sociologists, social psychologists, anthropologists, political scientists and educationalists to refer to the process of inheriting and disseminating norms, customs and ideologies...

 in all societies. According to the anthropologist Ruth Benedict
Ruth Benedict
Ruth Benedict was an American anthropologist, cultural relativist, and folklorist....

, culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...

s may be classified by their emphasis on the use of either shame or guilt to regulate the social activities of individuals. Shared opinions and expected behaviours and potential associated feelings of shame are in any case proven to be effective in guiding behaviour of a group or society.

Shame may be used by those people who commit relational aggression
Relational aggression
Relational aggression, also known as covert aggression or covert bullying, is a type of aggression in which harm is caused through damage to relationships or social status within a group rather than by means of actual or threatened physical violence...

 and may occur in the workplace as a form of overt social control or aggression. Shaming is also a central feature of punishment
Punishment
Punishment is the authoritative imposition of something negative or unpleasant on a person or animal in response to behavior deemed wrong by an individual or group....

, shunning
Shunning
Shunning can be the act of social rejection, or mental rejection. Social rejection is when a person or group deliberately avoids association with, and habitually keeps away from an individual or group. This can be a formal decision by a group, or a less formal group action which will spread to all...

, or ostracism. In addition, shame is often seen in victims of child neglect
Child neglect
Child neglect is defined as:# "the failure of a person responsible for a child’s care and upbringing to safeguard the child’s emotional and physical health and general well-being"...

 and child abuse
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...

.

Shame campaign

A shame campaign is a tactic in which particular individuals are singled out because of their behavior or suspected crimes, often by marking them publicly, such as Hester Prynne
Hester Prynne
Hester Prynne, the young protagonist of Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel The Scarlet Letter, is a woman condemned by her Puritan neighbors. The character has been called "among the first and most important female protagonists in American literature."...

 in Nathaniel Hawthorne
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer.Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in 1804 in the city of Salem, Massachusetts to Nathaniel Hathorne and the former Elizabeth Clarke Manning. His ancestors include John Hathorne, a judge during the Salem Witch Trials...

's The Scarlet Letter
The Scarlet Letter
The Scarlet Letter is an 1850 romantic work of fiction in a historical setting, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is considered to be his magnum opus. Set in 17th-century Puritan Boston during the years 1642 to 1649, it tells the story of Hester Prynne, who conceives a daughter through an...

. In the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

, Alfredo Lim
Alfredo Lim
Alfredo Siojo Lim is the incumbent Mayor of the City of Manila and a former senator of the Philippines. A widower, he first served as mayor of Manila from 1992 to 1998 and returned to that post after winning in the 2007 mayoral election.-Early life and career:Born on December 21, 1929 in 1324 J...

 popularized such tactics during his term as mayor of Manila
Manila
Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

. On July 1, 1997, he began a controversial "spray paint shame campaign” in an effort to stop drug use. He and his team sprayed bright red paint on two hundred squatter houses whose residents had been charged, but not yet convicted, of selling prohibited substances. Officials of other municipalities followed suit. Former Senator Rene A. Saguisag condemned Lim’s policy.

Despite this criticism, the shame campaigns continued. In January 2005, Metro Manila Development Authority Chair Bayani Fernando
Bayani Fernando
Bayani Flores Fernando is the former Chairman of the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority .He has announced his intention to run for President of the Philippines in the 2010 election. However, after talks with Richard Gordon, he agreed to slide as Vice President for Gordon's newly-established...

 announced a shame campaign to target jaywalkers by splashing them with wet rags. Sen. Richard Gordon
Richard Gordon (politician)
Richard "Dick" Juico Gordon is a Filipino politician and broadcaster who currently serves as the chairman of the Philippine National Red Cross....

 disagreed with the shame tactic, and Rep. Vincent Crisologo called this approach "martial law tactics". Rep. Rozzano Rufino Biazon argued jaywalkers were being treated like cattle.

See also

  • Badge of shame
    Badge of shame
    A badge of shame, also a symbol of shame, mark of shame, or simply a stigma, is typically a distinctive symbol required to be worn by a specific group or an individual for the purpose of public humiliation, ostracism, or persecution...

  • Shame society
    Shame society
    In cultural anthropology, a shame society is the concept that, in a given society, the primary device for gaining control over children and maintaining social order is the inculcation of shame and the complementary threat of ostracism...

  • Psychological projection
    Psychological projection
    Psychological projection or projection bias is a psychological defense mechanism where a person subconsciously denies his or her own attributes, thoughts, and emotions, which are then ascribed to the outside world, usually to other people...

  • Cognitive dissonance
    Cognitive dissonance
    Cognitive dissonance is a discomfort caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and actions. Dissonance is also reduced by justifying,...


Further reading

  • Bradshaw, J (1988) Healing the Shame That Binds You, HCI. ISBN 0-932194-86-9
  • Gilbert, P (2002) Body Shame: Conceptualisation, Research and Treatment. Brunner-Routledge. ISBN 1-58391-166-9
  • Gilbert, P (1998) Shame: Interpersonal Behavior, Psychopathology and Culture. ISBN 0-19-511480-9
  • Goldberg, Carl (1991) Understanding Shame, Jason Aaronson, Inc., Northvale, NJ. ISBN 0-87668-541-6
  • Hutchinson, Phil (2008) Shame and Philosophy. London: Palgrave MacMillan. ISBN 0-23-054271-9
  • Lewis, Michael (1992) Shame: The Exposed Self. NY: The Free Press. ISBN 0-02-918881-4
  • Middelton-Moz, J, (1990) Shame and Guilt: Masters of Disguise, HCI, ISBN 1-55874-072-4
  • Miller, Susan B. (1996) Shame in Context, Routledge, ISBN 0-88163-209-0
  • Morrison, Andrew P. (1996) The Culture of Shame. Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-37484-3
  • Morrison, Andrew P. (1989) Shame: The Underside of Narcissism. The Analytic Press. ISBN 0-88163-082-9
  • Nathanson, D., ed. (1987) The Many Faces of Shame. NY: The Guilford Press. ISBN 0-89862-705-2
  • Schneider, Carl D. (1977) Shame, Exposure, and Privacy. Boston: Beacon Press, ISBN 0-8070-1121-5
  • Vallelonga, Damian S. (1997) An empirical phenomenological investigation of being ashamed. In Valle, R. Phenomenological Inquiry in Psychology: Existential and Transpersonal Dimensions. New York: Plenum Press, 123-155.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK